Next one on is our dear Nao, who is right now more lost than ever.

Nao

I lounged on the bed idly flicking the pages of the new Vogue. Not that I was actually reading what little text there was, I just gazed at the pictures while trying not to think what could happen this night. Last night's patrol had been uneventful if not boring but Midori had had no news for us today so we were all more or less condemned to wait. In an attempt to alleviate some of my boredom I had changed from my assigned room to Shizuru's. As much as I hated to admit it, I had become so used to sleeping next to her, I was less comfortable when she wasn't next to me. But Shizuru had not mentioned anything about a double dorm to Midori and after walking the whole campus three times I had been too dead on my feet to sneak into her bed.

She hadn't been in her room when I entered, though. I heard water running and with a sigh, had flopped down on her bed. It was much harder than the one in our apartment. I had resigned myself to more waiting, picking up the magazine. Knowing Shizuru, it could take a good while until she was done in there.
Shizuru exited the bathroom in a cloud of steam, only a large towel wrapped around her body and another, smaller one around holding up her damp hair. Only a raise of her eyebrow gave indication that she even noticed my presence. Without a comment about it, she sat down at the dressing table. I watched her as she pulled the towel from her head and carefully brushed her sleek hair before beginning to blow-dry it.

I threw myself around on my back, staring at the ceiling. It was annoying me, that she ignored me, I had come to find my something outside my head to focus my attention on.
There were still Orphans running around Fuuka while none of us had an explanation where they came from. Why had they come out again this time around? The carnival had cost us everything we had and more I thought bitterly. Yes, miraculously all our most important persons were revived afterwards, as were we ourselves, but what did it matter to me when my mother did a year later, again. That time there was nobody around to magically bring her back to life. She was just dead and I had had to loose her twice, before I ended up being alone. Now, what was there left for us? Small wonder we were able to summon our elements again but not our Children. What bugged me the most about the whole thing was the question: Why had only the seven of us regained our powers this time and not all twelve HiME?
Not that I was keen on seeing any of the other HiME again, but why us. I had no nerve or energy to invest in this thing.

We all had Midori asked this very same question, but she had no answer to present. It made us uneasy; I had sensed it back in the class room and this morning at our meeting. Each of them had looked uncomfortably when our great leader had to announce her and Himeno-san's research had not yielded any significant results, even Shizuru had appeared mildly surprised, although I doubted anybody besides me had been able to read her well enough to notice.
Not knowing anything, that was our starting point before the Carnival as well. It made them afraid of what was to come. I couldn't say I liked it much either.

Midori had said she would look into the old accounts more for a hint of what was going on, would search until she found something. In the meantime we were to look out for one another and watch for anything that seemed even remotely suspicious or possibly connected to the reappearance of the Orphans. Sure that'll help, I thought sarcastically, that woman was over thirty now and still every bit as naïve as ever. What good was it to basically have us act after trouble had already occurred?

The sound of the blow-dryer had stopped and I turned on my stomach to see Shizuru putting aside her brush and reaching for her make-up now. She put on the full package: foundation, make-up, mascara, powder.

I slid off the bed and came up behind her. With one hand resting on her bare shoulder I regarded her image in the mirror for a moment. She was beautiful.

"You're putting a lot of work in this. Any plans for the evening?" I whispered in her ear with a seductive drawl in my voice. Shizuru had just finished applying dark red lipstick. I came around to her front and kissed her on her freshly coloured lips. She opened her mouth, allowing me entrance, but refused to meet my tongue with her own as she normally would. I pulled back, not without biting her softly in her bottom lip. It was the weirdest kiss we had ever shared, like she couldn't make up her mind whether she craved our physical connection or not.

"Would you mind leaving for a while later?" she asked me, her eyes fixed on her image in the mirror, reapplying the lipstick I had so effectively smeared just now. "How nice that this would be the first thing you say to me." I remarked. Shizuru didn't respond to my bait. "Natsuki is coming over tonight," she simply said.

"Oh" I smirked, feigning nonchalance even though Kuga was the last person I wanted to be ditched for, apart from Shiho maybe. That woman gave me the creeps.
"So that's what the 'come-and-get-me-style' is about: you're trying to get her into bed."

"Maybe, she was very passionate yesterday." Shizuru replied, her voice as even as if she was talking about the weather. I stared at her for the fraction of a second in the mirror, unbelieving. Her mask was impenetrable right now, a perfect picture of impassiveness and lips that just begged to be kissed. I made sure to scratch her bare shoulder with my nails before I turned and walked out into the living room. "Wear a black thong Shizuru, I'm sure she likes the view of your ass." I tossed over my shoulder as I excited.

It was a petty remark, but I couldn't care less what Shizuru thought about it right now. She gave my feelings no thought either, simply throwing me out of her room like that. Although part of me had been almost sure that Shizuru would go and try for Kuga as soon as I saw her in the council room yesterday, I did not expect anything to happen so soon. I knew Shizuru had lived with her before our arrangement came to be, but she had never shared any details. I didn't know why Kuga had broken up with her, however I had foolishly hoped Shizuru would have been over her after so much time. Couldn't that woman see how pathetic she was being? And what the hell was up with Kuga, I wondered. In high school she couldn't even hug people without blushing and now she slept with Shizuru the first night they saw each other again. I couldn't really believe it, briefly I considered Shizuru to be lying, but discarded the thought because: what reason did she have to lie to me?

From the looks of it Kuga would soon be here and until she got here I would stay, to have a nice little chat with her. If I was to be deprived of Shizuru's company for the evening, I would make sure to get at least some sort of entertainment out of the situation.

Sure enough, not ten minutes later there was a soft knock on the door and Shizuru was still in the bedroom. In a flash I was at the door. With a flourish I bade our guest to enter. "Hello Kuga." I offered with a false smile.

Her dumbfounded expression had me grinning wide. Whatever she had expected to see coming here, it had not been me.

"What the hell are you doing here Nao?" she hissed.

"What, can't I drop in with a fellow HiME and spent time with her?" I asked all innocence. "In fact it's only natural I would be here, after all I have lived with Shizuru for quite some years already. Isn't that right Shizuru?" I called back into the apartment as she chose this perfectly timed moment to exit the bedroom.

"Yes that's true." Shizuru answered, though she did not look too pleased about my little scene. I was delighted however: Kuga's bewildered look switched between me and Shizuru while Shizuru herself was giving me an icy glare. "But she was about to leave right now."

This could not have been any better in this situation. "Have a nice time catching up." I sang in a false cheery voice. As if they hadn't caught up enough yesterday. When I pushed by Natsuki who was still standing in the doorway, I paused shortly to whisper into her ear. "I hope you're up to her, she likes it rough, you know."

Let them see what a wonderful get together this would be.

Left with the choice of returning to my own empty room or bothering one of the other girls, I decided I might as well heed Midori's advice and snoop around a bit. However slim the chances of me finding anything it was preferable to sitting around in my room doing nothing.

"Watch out for anything that seems unusual or suspicious." had been Midori's words. Great help they were. With no other intelligence on the matter all I could do was basically wandered around aimlessly waiting for an orphan or whatever to stumble right in front of me.

'Anything unusual'. I snorted. I had actually seen unusual right back there with Kuga and Shizuru, I thought sarcastically, though that wasn't the kind of unusual Midori had meant. Funny what time can do to people. I always had known Shizuru was a masochist, but I would never have guessed she'd take the girl back, even as a fuck buddy after she broke her heart. Not to mention I never would have gauged Kuga as so easy.
Nevertheless, it was stupid, plain stupid. Kuga walked out on Fujino leaving her a desolate wreck who jumps off of the nearest cliff, then after years she comes back in her life due to circumstances and Fujino is so whatever that she takes the chance right away. Thinking about these two idiots makes me glad I never fall in love.

Nagi had always been hanging around the glass dome last time and while Midori had most likely had had similar thoughts already, it was as good as any place to start. The door was locked this time of the night, but I still had retained my many talents from my delinquent times and it swung open for me in no time. Inside it was dark, the lights were off and the control god knows where. The flash light in my phone would have to do.
Slowly I let the beam wander, waiting for something to catch my eye. The handrail around the middle was filled with ribbons just like had it been in my own school days. Some things never seemed to change. I had never placed one there, not being the superstitious type. The ribbons were not going to be of use though, so I left them alone. From up here my meagre light did not even reach the bottom of the layer below, but I guessed if I were to find interesting things it might be down there.
On the lower level it was even harder to see anything. Upstairs at least a little bit of light had been coming in through the glass dome, shed by the street lights outside, down here I wasn't even able to make out contours of anything. My little light beam wandered slowly over shelves stuffed with books. I didn't bother with those, books were Midori's domain. The last time I had been in Fuuka, I had never come down here and why would I have. Most of the time I had been too busy being off campus, luring paedophiles into alleys and robbing them off, instead of hanging around old stuffy books. Maybe I would now a secret about this place now, if things had been different I thought.

'If things had been different.' This could be applied to countless instances in my life I told myself with a hint of bitterness.

Just when a piece of empty wall came into my sight and I halted my steps, wondering why there was not bookshelf next to bookshelf like before, I heard the doors upstairs creak open. Somebody else was here besides me. I bit my lip, deliberating my next move. I could continue my exploration down here or head up to see whoever else was sneaking around here at this hour.
Noiselessly I headed upstairs, which wasn't easy considering I had to turn off my little light. By the time I reached the upper level, the door was already closed again. Going outside without being seen was impossible, but I simply had to hope whoever had exited before me, was not looking back.
Looking left and right I saw no one around the dome, holding my breath I listened, but I couldn't make out the sound of steps. On chance I headed left, around the building. Seemed like I wasn't the only one getting lucky tonight, at least in a sense. Up ahead I could see a shadow, turning away from the other faculty buildings. There was no guarantee this was the person I just heard inside the glass dome, but it was my best guess and the only person around, so I quickly followed them.
It was good I had always been adapt at reading body language, taking in even the slightest jerks in a person's behaviour, or else I wouldn't have been able to dive behind the bushes lining the path in time as they suddenly turned around.

Whoever they were, they were apparently afraid of being followed, which made me more determined to chase them. This was becoming fun, a smirk slowly spreading over my face. In my head I counted to seven, then I raised my head just enough to quint over the hedges. Sure enough, my target was moving again, more briskly now and it would be hard for me to not loose sight in the night without also making too much noise. I liked a challenge.
Slowly I was gaining ground and was able to see a bit more. Guessing their height to be rather small, maybe even less tall than I and dark hair, falling down to about their chin. By this alone it could have been anybody. They were wearing a long coat, hiding any distinctive features of their body but judging by the shoulders it was a woman. Not even the most feminine guy I had ever encountered had such slender shoulders.

They couldn't have seen me, careful as I had been in my sneaking, however something must have set them on the edge, all of a sudden she started running towards the outer wall of the campus, ducking between two houses. I speed up too when it felt like my head was about to burst. In shock from the sudden pain I stumbled and couldn't catch myself. My knees and arms painfully collied with the pavement. Where it had came from I couldn't tell, I had been fine just a moment ago and now it felt as if somebody was gleefully sticking hot needles into my skull. I pressed my hands to my head, trying to block the pain out, to no avail. Bile was rising in my throat, I could already taste it in the back of my mouth and then the pain was gone, just as abruptly as it had come.
Carefully I pushed myself up on my hands and knees, taking deep breaths to calm myself. When I wasn't seeing white flashes in front of my eyes anymore I looked around but of course my target had disappeared.
I dragged myself back onto my feet. So much for finding anything out tonight. Normally I would have at least Shizuru giving me a good orgasm to relax to look forward to, but this was out of the question tonight as well.
I had known coming back here to Fuuka would not be a good idea.